


William's

by sam80853



Category: Hawaii Five-0 (2010)
Genre: Alternate Universe, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-11-07
Updated: 2016-11-07
Packaged: 2018-08-29 13:54:16
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,170
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/8492305
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/sam80853/pseuds/sam80853
Summary: Steve returns home to solve his father's murder and stumbles, quite by accident, into Danny's diner.





	

**Author's Note:**

> This is my first attempt at Hawaii Five-O, McDanno.  
> Huge thanks to mrspadrona and ChuckleVoodoos for their beta work - you rock!

Steve had been back on the island three days, buried his father yesterday and was quite unsettled on where to go from here. 

 

Never had he been uncertain about what to do next. As a Lieutenant Commander in the Navy, a SEAL, there was no such thing as idle time. If there wasn’t a mission, there was training; if there wasn’t training, one could always expect to be on a mission. That had been his life for the past ten years which had suited him just fine. Being occupied had kept him from thinking about his father, or his sister. Steve had lost touch with either of them a long time ago. 

 

Now his father was dead and his sister hadn’t even shown up at the funeral. For just a second, Steve’s chest hurt - his father was dead. No, not just dead but murdered. Steve took a deep breath, willing the dark thoughts away. There was no point in dwelling on the past; he couldn’t change that. All he could do now was solve his father’s murder and go back to the life he knew.

 

While Steve was occupied with his thought - or rather trying to suppress his feelings about his father’s death - his eyes fell upon something he was certain had not been here before. Nor did it belong here: a diner in the form of a train carriage that looked like it would fit right in at a busy street in New York or -- Jersey, as the writing on the carriage suggested.

 

Steve shook his head in disbelief. Who in their right mind would open a diner like this in Hawaii?

 

Steve’s interest was piqued; he could do with a distraction, ‘And something to eat.’, he thought when his stomach growled. When was the last time he had eaten? It wouldn’t do him well to neglect himself. 

 

A bell above the door jingled when Steve entered and instead of the empty diner he'd expected, with this being Hawaii after all, he was surprised to find the small space almost filled to capacity at 10AM. Not just tourists either, Steve noticed. Quite a few appeared to be locals sitting at the bar-like counter, chatting over cups of coffee. And despite that, the place wasn’t too loud had an oddly familiar feeling to it that Steve couldn’t quite place.

 

Steve found a seat in the back of the diner and sat down, his back to the wall, scanning his surroundings. There were three locals at the counter, deeply engrossed in their discussion, a tourist family of four two rows in front of him, and five teenage-girls giggling over coffee while pointing at the man behind the counter.

 

The guy was short, to put it mildly, Steve smiled with amusement as he gauged the attitude that was rolling off the guy as he worked. To compensate for the height disparity, maybe. He had blond hair and hands that seemingly never stopped moving. At the moment he was occupied with a maybe eight or nine-year-old girl sitting at the end of the counter, telling an obviously very interesting story if the man’s gestures were to be believed..

 

The five girls giggled some more and Steve was distracted for barely a second when the man showed up in front of him.

 

“What can I get you?” He asked in an obvious Jersey accent and some things fell into place for Steve.

 

“Some juice would be nice, pineapple if you have it.” Steve must have said something wrong because the man went rigid for a second before he seemed to get his reaction under control.

 

“No can do,” the man answered, bouncing on the balls of his feet. “There is no pineapple in this place.”

 

“You know, you are in Hawaii right,” Steve checked, cocking his head.

 

“Right, like I could forget that I live on a pineapple-infested rock. For just one second.” The man’s voice has risen but he didn’t seem to be really angry. It sounded more like a statement, or an argument he had had many times before.

 

“Danno!” The little girl from the counter called out and the man visible relaxed.

 

“Coffee?” The man asked, all business again.

 

“What’s a Danno?”

 

“Not what, who.” The man said. “And me, I’m Danno. Danny to you,” he added, his attitude on the rise again.

 

Steve felt his own amusement rise in correlation to the attitude. This was fun; the man, Danny, was fun.

 

“Why is it that she can call you Danno?” Steve asked in a childlike tone, grinning. He hadn’t felt this relaxed in years.

 

“She,” Danny stressed, “is my little girl, the centre of my universe. Whereas you? You are just a pineapple-demanding annoyance.” There still wasn’t any malice in Danny’s voice and Steve figured that was just the way the other man talked. A quick look around confirmed it. Everyone, including the tourists, was looking at them with amusement.

 

“And I’m cute,” the little girl said, grinning like she had heard this many, many times before.

 

Danny laughed. “That you are, Monkey. That you are.”

 

“So am I,” Steve said, not quite certain where that had come from.

 

Danny stilled for a second, seemingly baffled. Then he laughed. A heartfelt belly-laugh.

 

“Okay,” Danny admitted. “I ran right into that one, didn’t I?”

 

Steve relaxed, relieved Danny took his unintended remark in stride.

 

“My name is Steve by the way,” he said.

 

“Alright, Steve,” Danny said. “As much as I like talking to you, I have a business to run…”

 

“About that,” Steve interrupted.

 

“Ah-ah,” Danny said, interrupting Steve in turn, “I’m the boss and you, Steven, are the customer. So, other than pineapple, what can I get you?”

 

Steve grinned. “Coffee. Black.”

 

“That wasn’t so hard, was it?” Danny said, obviously satisfied with Steve’s request and vanished behind the counter.

 

A minute later a freshly brewed cup of coffee was put in front of Steve and he had to admit, that maybe, he needed coffee more than pineapple juice. It smelled heavenly.

 

“You are welcome,” Danny said, all smiles for a moment before Steve grabbed a piece of butter that had been on the table and dumped it in his cup. Danny reached for the coffee, rising to his full height and addressed the diner.

 

"What the hell is the matter? Did you see that? This -- NEANDERTHAL! just dumped BUTTER into my perfectly brewed coffee!"

 

“It’s healthy,” Steve defended his choice, not quite understanding what the big deal was here. 

 

“Healthy, he says!”, Danny ranted on. “I could have made you an omelette if you wanted healthy!”

 

“Calm down, Danno, it’s just coffee.”

 

Danny stopped in mid-rant. “Just…,” his hands went up like he needed to protect himself. “Okay, I can’t even talk to you right now.”, he finished and left Steve’s table, leaving the coffee behind..

 

Steve was stunned, not understanding what had just happened. He looked around and everyone was looking at him, saying in unison: “Don’t ever insult Danny’s coffee.”

 

Steve nodded his head in acknowledgement. His training as a SEAL had taught him to pay attention to his environment, not just the people in it. Had he been on his game, he'd have noticed something very important about Williams' interior.  
There were quite a few different styles of coffee makers visible behind the counter. Equipment Steve hadn’t seen outside of Italy. Or Spain. It looked like Danny did offer a great selection of coffee. This, obvious to Steve now, wasn’t just a diner.

 

Steve took a sip of his coffee, a feeling of loneliness engulfing him now that he was by himself again. For just a short time Danny and his bigger than life attitude had made his dark thoughts disappear, like they didn’t even exist.

 

But his father was still dead and there were decisions that needed to be made. Steve rose from his seat, paid for his coffee on his way out and left.

 

~*~*~*~

 

Steve's already small world became microscopic when he entered what had once been his father's home; the house that was now technically his. He hadn’t done anything yet - there were still overturned furniture, broken glass, and above all, his father’s blood on the floor where he had been killed by Victor Hesse.

 

The crime scene unit had left a few days ago, gathering all the evidence they could. Not much else had happened since then. It appeared that HPD didn't consider the murder of one of their own a priority. That needed to be changed. 

 

Steve reached for his phone, returning the last incoming call, which had been the Governor of Hawaii expressing her condolences and offering Steve a job, a job that would allow him to pursue his father’s murderer in any way he deemed fit.

 

“Governor, I will take the job,” Steve said as soon as his call was connected. He felt better immediately. He had made a choice; he shouldn’t have waited that long.

 

“I, Steven J. McGarrett, do solemnly declare upon my honour and conscience that I will act at all times to the best of my ability and knowledge in a manner befitting an officer of the law."

 

When Steve hung up he went to the garage, reminiscing for a moment about the times he'd spent out here. Sure enough, the old Marquis was still out here, under a dust cloth. A pang of regret settled into Steve's chest; he should have reached out more, stayed in touch more. Perhaps then -- well, it was too late now. All he could do now was avenge his father's murder.

 

He was readying to leave the garage when his eye caught something that triggered a memory. When he'd been on the phone with his father, John had used the name "Champ" several times and that was something he'd never used before. Sitting in the corner of the garage was an old red toolbox with a sticker, half covered in oil, reading "CHAMP". Steve highly doubted this was a coincidence.

 

Steve opened the box and he had been right; instead of tools he found pictures, transcripts, and cassette tapes. It looked like his father had been investigating something that he’d wanted Steve to know about. 

 

Carefully filtering through the evidence in front of him, Steve realized that this investigation was going way back to when his family had been torn apart by his mother’ death, and even a bit before. In fact it looked like his father had looked into Doris McGarrett’s death way more closely than a simple car accident would have warranted. Secret’s were spilled in front of Steve’s eyes, secrets he couldn’t believe his father had never told him about and had rather taken to his grave.

 

Steve was sitting at the kitchen table, reading and sorting his father’s evidence until the sun came up once again. His body hurt from being in one position all night long, his eyes were tired. Exhaustion was about to overwhelm him. He needed -- coffee.

 

~*~*~*~

 

Upon entering Williams’, Danny took one look at him, rushed around the counter and grabbed Steve by his arm. “Sit down before you faceplant onto my floor,” Danny commanded and pushed Steve onto one of the stools at the counter. “Have you no self-preservation? Tell me you did not drive here.” He demanded and shook his hands in a I-don-t-wanna-know-gesture when Steve indeed was about to tell him that he had driven here. “Jesus, Steve,” he said, rushed behind the counter and was back with a cup of coffee in record time. “Drink that!”

 

“Thanks Danno.”

 

“Do not call me that!” Danny bristled and left him to his coffee.

 

Steve hadn’t even thought about what he must look like. SEAL training had taught him to function on very little sleep and under more stressful situation than his current one. But he felt beat, utterly exhausted. Sleepless nights and combat training, missions were easier to handle than his personal demons. Regrets he would rather not have…

 

“C’mon over here,” Danny was suddenly by his side again and he grabbed his arm. Again.

 

“Why are you pushing me around, Danny,” Steve muttered tiredly, not much resistance on his part. “I’m not a rag doll.”

 

“You, my friend, scare my customers,” Danny said easily, putting a plate on front of Steve. “Eat that and when you are halfway human again you can come up,” Danny pointed at the counter, “and talk to me like a normal human being.”

 

“Understood,” Steve nodded and dug into his food. Man, he was hungry and the plate with eggs & bacon Danny had put in front of him smelled like the best thing Steve had ever seen.

 

Three cups of coffee and an egg refill later, Steve felt so much better. He really needed to look after himself better, he thought, or come here and let Danny deal with it. Steve stopped eating, his fork halfway to his mouth. Where the hell had that come from?

 

“Steve McGarrett, right?”

 

A local, rather familiar looking man had approached Steve’s table.

 

“I know you,” Steve said, trying hard to put a name to the face. 

 

“You’d better,” the man smiled. “Chin Ho Kelly.”

 

“Kukui High School!”

 

“I’m sorry about your father, Steve,” Chin’s face became somber. “I worked with your father in the Seventh. He taught me everything I know about wearing a badge.”

 

“Looks like you moved on to greener pasture,” Steve pointed at Chin’s tourist guide uniform.

 

Chin chuckled humourlessly: “Well, let's just say the Honolulu Police and I had a disagreement over my job description.”

 

There was obviously a story there but Steve let it go for now.

 

“Your coffee's ready, Chin,” Danny called from the counter and putting a to-go cup on the counter.

 

“Didn’t take you long to find the best coffee in town,” Chin grinned at Steve again and turned. “Let me know if you need anything,” he said, paid and was out the door before a thought could manifest in Steve’s head.

 

“Hey,” he called after Chin, rising from his seat. “Chin!” Steve caught up with him outside.

 

“Maybe you can do something,” Steve said and not five minutes later, had recruited his first co-worker for the newly formed task force.

 

~*~*~*~

 

“You a cop?” Danny asked when Steve re-entered the diner.

 

“Navy,” Steve answered looking at Danny curiously. His easy attitude had changed to wariness. “Are you running from the law, Danno?” He had hoped to lighten the mood but had obviously hit a sore spot.

 

“Ex-cop,” Danny said with regret in his voice. “Jersey PD.” He turned his back towards Steve and busied himself, obviously trying to avoid the topic of discussion. But Steve hadn’t worked in Naval Intelligence for nothing. He couldn’t just let go of such a vital piece of information.

 

“What happened?”

 

“Life happened, Steven,” real annoyance crept into Danny’s voice. “My ex-wife married a rich schmuck and relocated my daughter to this ever-sunny and sandy with beaches everywhere hellhole.” Danny’s voice had risen and his hands had been all over the place during his outburst.

 

“Most people consider this paradise.”

 

“Paradise, my ass,” Danny said lamely. “I didn’t have a choice, so here I am.”

 

“Why not HPD?” Steve was seriously curious now. Danny had given up his life to be with his daughter - what father does that?

 

“Right,” Danny laughed without humour, his eyes sad. “You can only take so many utterances of “haole” before it becomes tiring and when back-up doesn’t show up as quickly as it should, it becomes dangerous, and I came here so see Grace grow up, so I quit.”

 

“You quit?”

 

“Yes, I quit, Steve,” Danny’s fire was back. “What of it?”

 

“You quit to own a diner?” Steve voiced in utter disbelief..

 

“Actually, Gracie owns the diner but yes, that’s the gist of it.”

 

“You mean to tell me that your eight-year…”

 

“Nine.”

 

“Nine-year-old daughter owns a diner and signs your paycheque?”

 

Steve’s face must have been a sight because instead of being offended Danny burst out laughing.

 

“You are something else,” Danny said between laughs. “Maybe I will tell you that story someday.”

 

“Oh c'mon, Danny.”

 

“Go away, Steve, I have work to do. My daughter is a slave driver I’ll have you know.”

 

~*~*~*~

 

Turning up any leads to Victor Hesse’s whereabouts turned out more complicated than Steve had anticipated for an island the size of Hawaii. 

 

People were scared and even with Chin’s calming demeanour they were hitting brick walls left, right and centre. It was frustrating. 

 

With the SEALs, on missions, Steve hadn’t had to worry about these kind of details. Once he had gotten the ‘go’ everything was in place; the detective work had been done by somebody else already.

 

More days than not lately, Steve started and ended his days at Williams’; something about the place made him feel - welcome. But, maybe it was just Danny that kept him on his toes, stopping him from brooding too much and even offering good advice on pieces of his father’s puzzle that Steve had started to bring to the diner to look at over breakfast.

 

“Once you drag crime-scene photos in here, I chuck you out,” Danny said easily, as he sat across from Steve and put his own coffee down..

 

“Give me some credit, Danny,” Steve complained. “I would never do that with Gracie around,” he said, quickly looking up to check on Danny’s daughter, who was sitting at the counter eating breakfast. “Driver picking her up for school?” He asked.

 

A few days ago Danny had opened up to him some more, telling him the gory details of his divorce and custody battle with his ex-wife Rachel. Apparently Danny had gotten the short stick when it came to visitation rights. Steve didn’t get it. Danny was deeply devoted to his daughter; why would anyone try to keep him out of her life?

 

Maybe with the re-establishment of his contacts on the island Steve could do something about it.

 

“He’s running late,” Danny sighed with a glance at his watch. “I may have to lock up and give her a ride myself.”

 

Steve looked around at the busy place. Yes, at the moment Danny was sitting at his table but no doubt he knew the exact second someone needed something.

 

“I could drive her,” Steve offered, surprising himself.

 

Danny looked at him dumbfounded: “You want to drop off my daughter at school?”

 

“Just saying,” Steve back paddled, “I could. If you wanted me to.”

 

“Hey, Monkey,” Danny’s voice rose to be heard by his daughter. “Do you want Steve give you a ride to school?”

 

To Steve’s surprise the whole diner turned silent, outright curious looks were exchanged like this was something that had never happened before.

 

“Are you sure, Danno?” Grace asked hesitantly, walking toward their table.

 

“I’m good if you are,” he said and you could hear a needle drop on the floor.

 

Grace smiled at Steve and reached for his hand.

 

“Let’s go, Steve, I don’t want to be late.” She said and pulled him out of his seat, still holding onto his hand. “Love you, Danno!”

 

“Love you more, Monkey.”

 

Steve felt - helpless, out of his depth when Grace lead him through the diner and out the door. Danny trusted him with his daughter; Grace trusted him to drop her off safely.

 

“You can do this, McGarrett,” Steve whispered under his breath when he buckled Grace in.

 

“Are you alright, Steve?” Grace asked.

 

“Fine. I’m fine,” Steve tried to convince her, his eyes never wavering off the traffic ahead.

 

“Danno said you may be nervous,” Grace continued, smiling at Steve with big brown eyes. Oh God, he was so screwed. “School isn’t scary,” she stated matter-of-factly. “Maybe Mr. Thompson is a bit -- intimidating but it’s all for show,” Grace assured. “Like Danno.”

 

Steve’s head spun and his heart was beating way too fast. He wasn’t good with kids and this, this was Danny’s kid. He could not screw this up.

 

“You did good, Steve,” Grace petted his arm when she unbuckled her seatbelt, and Steve rushed out and around the car to help her get out.

 

“Have a good day, Gracie,” he smiled down at her.

 

“You too, Steve,” she said and hugged his middle for a second before she run off.

 

Steve needed to sit down, and his butt hit the sidewalk hard. He was trying to calm his breathing when his phone rang with an “Unidentified caller”.

 

“You better have dropped her off safely, Steven,” came Danny’s voice through the speaker and Steve started grinning. 

 

“How did you get my number?”

 

“I still have sources, Steve, and don’t deflect.”

 

“She’s fine, Danny. Don’t panic.”

 

“Don’t panic?” Danny almost yelled. “I wasn’t the one walking out of here as if on death row. I had no idea the army trained men to be afraid of nine-year-old girls.”

 

“Navy, Danny. I was in the Navy and I’m sure some people from the diner followed me here.”

 

“You are paranoid!”

 

“I’m really not,” Steve assured, sobering up suddenly. “Why did you let me take her, Danny?” he asked.

 

“See you later, Steve,” Danny answered and hung up.

 

Steve looked at his phone for a while before he decided to not just drive back to Williams’ and demand an answer. He wouldn’t even know what to do with an answer no matter what it was.

 

~*~*~*~

 

This seemed to be Steve’s lucky day. First Grace and now Chin turned up a lead on their case.

 

“According to my man Kamekona, a guy by the name of Sang Min runs the island's human import/export business. Hesse could use him to get off the island.”

 

Steve nodded. “Let's say this guy's for real. He’s got no reason to tell us where Hesse is.”

 

“Well, we find some leverage, twist his arm,” Chin suggested, obviously happy to be back working as an officer of the law, so to speak.

 

“Simple bait-and-trap. Wire up an undercover, send him in,” Steve said, eager to get some results, finally.

 

“Only one problem, malihini,” Chin said. “That might work well on the mainland, but we're on an island with less than a million people. Which means the bad guys know the good guys.”

 

Steve frowned. Chin was right; this island was too small to just sent in any HPD officer undercover.

 

“I may have a solution though,” Chin grinned.

 

~*~*~*~

 

Steve and Chin met Chin’s cousin Kono Kalakaua at William’s for lunch and Steve liked her immediately. She had potential, Steve figured. With guidance and experience that would come over time, she could become a great cop. It was just too bad that nobody at HPD would give her a chance because of her close relations to Chin. Their loss. 

 

“Welcome to Five-O,” Steve said to Kono, smiling.

 

“What’s Five-O,” Kono asked, looking curiously between her cousin and Steve.

 

“We are,” Steve answered, leaning back in his seat. “My dad used to call our family ‘five-o’s’ because we weren’t native Hawaiians. After the 50th state in the Union, I think.”

 

Chin nodded his head in approval and Kono smiled: “I like it.”

 

Steve felt -- content. He had found two people he could work with on his new task force, he had a lead on Sang Min and…

 

“Is that a pineapple, brah?” Chin asked, pointing at something on Steve’s plate, and indeed a sad little yellow slice of pineapple had made it onto Steve’s lunch platter.

 

“I thought Danny didn’t serve pineapples,” Steve heard Kono say but it was more like a background sound. He had looked from his plate to Danny who was standing behind the counter, holding his gaze.

 

A pineapple.

 

The implications of a sad, single slice of pineapple on Steve’s plate were huge and it felt like Steve couldn’t breathe for a second. The diner had become tiny, soundless. Steve could only hear his own beating heart, and see nothing but Danny, who was still holding his gaze.

 

Steve’s peripheral vision rushed back in when, out of the corner of his eye, he saw Kono reaching for his pineapple with her folk.

 

“Mine,” something resembling a growl escaped his throat and Steve snatched up the fruit and swallowed it down.

 

Kono looked perplexed for a second before she started laughing, Chin joining her a second later.

 

“Animal,” Steve could see Danny mouth from the counter, shaking his head and Steve started grinning happily.

 

“When you are done flirting with Danny, maybe we could work on our plan?” Chin asked matter-of-factly and Steve almost choked on his food.

 

“Relax, brah,” Kono smiled, padding Steve’s back.

 

“I’m...I…” Steve stuttered, feeling heat rising in his face. “We are not…” he tried again, helplessly.

 

“Pineapple,” Chin and Kono said in unison and Steve fell silent.

 

Was Danny flirting with him?

 

“You’ll figure it out, soldier,” the man in question was suddenly standing at their table, smiling. “No rush,” Danny said, putting down their bill and Steve had lost all control over what was being said. 

 

Did Danny talk about their bill? Him figuring things out? What?


End file.
